Ishaan is 3 times as old as Ben and is also 14 years older than Ben. How old is Ben?
Answer: We can use the given information to write down two equations that describe the ages of Ishaan and Ben. Let Ishaan's current age be $i$ and Ben's current age be $b$ $i = 3b$ $i = b + 14$ Now we have two independent equations, and we can solve for our two unknowns. Since we are looking for $b$ , and both of our equations have $i$ alone on one side, this is a convenient time to use elimination. Subtracting the second equation from the first equation, we get: $0 =$ $3b$ $-$ $ (b + 14)$ which combines the information about $b$ from both of our original equations. Solving for $b$ , we get: $2 b = 14$ $b = 7$.